According to Christopher Flavin, the President emeritus of the Worldwatch Institute, in a few years’ time wind energy will not need to be subsidised. Oh wait! He said that back in 1984.

And he was not alone, Booz, Allen & Hamilton did a report in 1983 saying the same thing as did Amory Lovins and the American Wind Energy Association testified that California Energy Commission had predicted wind would soon be cheaper than all other plants.

Politicians and the mainstream media persist in their faith in the pronouncements these ideologically committed and interested parties continue to make.

And so it is here in Australia. The debate on the continuation of the Renewable Energy Target continues, even though its direct impost on the Australian community will be $29-38 billion, and its indirect costs much greater.

One of the mouthpieces for the industry, Business Spectator’s Tristan Edis, has declared that the rorters of the energy consumer in the wind industry find it totally unacceptable that the Renewable Energy Target should be reduced. They want their subsidies maintained.

Earlier this week there was an “emergency Clean Energy Summit” meeting called by the South Australian Premier. According to its Communique seventy “clean energy and community leaders” attended but, in addition to the usual array of state public servants, these seem to have been confined to the renewable industry royalty and their advisers.

Speakers included John Hewson, who demonstrated his incisive wit by saying, “if you’re talking about barnacles, get rid of this one.” (and no, he did not mean get rid of the RET). Also preaching was Ross Garnaut who “discussed the underlying economics influencing the sector and explained that Australia has a natural advantage for low-cost production of renewable energy. He explained how the low cost of renewables would create a cost advantage for local industry into the long-term future.” There would have been some insights there!

The Summit urged the government to keep forcing consumers to give money to the industry so that it could continue to employ people and finance campaigns that undermine the economy.

With a product that cannot possibly be competitive without massive subsidies, it is understandable that the renewables sector would target a great deal of their expenditure on marketing to the political actors and into Get Up’s tv ads.Catallaxy Files

Keen observations and insights there from Alan Moran – as usual. But spearing Christopher Flavin’s piffle, from way back in 1984, that “in a few years’ time wind energy will not need to be subsidised” holds the same degree of challenge as shooting fish in a barrel.

The wind industry, its parasites and spruikers – like The Climate Speculator’s, Tristan Edis – are still running the same line 30 years later. Hmmm ….

In order to counter the recent challenge to the LRET and its insane cost to power consumers, these boys have been pedaling the fantasy that wind power is (now) competitive with conventional generation sources – see this piece of twaddle from ruin-economy, for example. The teensy, weensy internal flaw in their pitch about the cost of wind power unravels when its propaganda merchants – like Edis – find it “totally unacceptable that the Renewable Energy Target should be reduced”.

So which is it, Tristan?

Is wind power a truly competitive power generation source and, therefore, capable of selling itself without the need for the $50 billion worth of Renewable Energy Certificates, to be collected by retailers through retail power bills as a tax on all Australian power consumers and delivered to wind power outfits as a guaranteed subsidy over the next 17 years? (Retailers have a “choice”, of course: it’s either purchase wind power to pick up RECs or get whacked with a $65 per MWh fine). See our posts here and here and here.

Or – is wind power just a perpetual infant, that will never “grow up” – because, in the absence of massive subsidies and punishing fines, retailers wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole? See our posts here and here.

The carry-on from energy policy pygmies – like SA’s vapid Labor Premier, Jay Weatherill and John Hewson – is little more than the whining we’ve come to expect from the profiteers and rent seekers that pretend to give a fig about Australia’s economic future.

Weatherill’s intervention to help try and save the wind industry is perfectly aligned with the Labor/Union/Union Super Fund model of building Labor’s political war-chest by profiting handsomely from the $billions they’ve invested in wind power outfits, like Pac Hydro – while happily belting power consumers, punishing cash-strapped families and smashing businesses (see our posts here and here).

John Hewson – the bloke that lost the Liberals the unloseable 1993 Federal election when, during a TV interview, he couldn’t explain the impact of his proposed GST (consumption tax) on the cost of a birthday cake – is so in bed with the wind industry that they, no doubt, have fights about who gets their fair share of the quilt.

So, you reckon the section on explaining the GST’s impact on the cost of a birthday cake will seal it?

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Hewson has become the paid-up front man for the ‘green’-Stalinists at the Australia Institute, where he’s taken to slamming the real energy sector and promoting the fantasy that wind power will, somehow, “save” the planet.

But, with Hewson, there could just be a scintilla of mercenary self-interest in play.

Hewson has been heavily tied up with investment banks – like Macquarie, as well as a number of Super Funds – that have invested heavily in the great wind power fraud: his recent rantings about saving the LRET are obviously directed at protecting their (and his) investments; and in keeping the REC gravy train rolling for years to come.

But it’s the hysterical hectoring from Hewson and Weatherill etc that tends to give the real game away: an “emergency Clean Energy Summit”. Really? Sure the wind industry’s on life-support, but, thanks to policy pygmies like Weatherill, so is South Australia.

Fitting it was, that the wind power fraudsters’ little “emergency” wind power “love-in” took place in Adelaide, SA.

Thanks, in no small part, to its insane wind-rush, South Australians are forced to pay the highest retail power prices in the world (for the details on why, see our post here).

Last week saw the announcement that, yet another, energy intensive business had folded in SA: a metal foundry owned by Bradken will close next year – with the loss of 120 jobs. Bradken’s executive general manager of mineral processing Brad Ward, attributed the closure of the plant to, among other things, “the high costs of … utilities that make the foundry ‘unsustainable’.”

The 120 workers and their families really will have an “emergency” on their hands, as they struggle to find new jobs in a State that’s going backwards at the speed of sound; and that, thanks to its crippling power costs, has the highest rate of unemployment among the mainland States (see our post here).

Adding to their woes will be the cost of powering their homes – especially if they fail to find any kind of employment.

It’s not just businesses that are copping a belting from SA’s insanely costly effort to rely on wind power: thousands of households can no longer afford power at all.

South Australia has nation’s highest rate of power disconnections
The Advertiser
David Nankervis
10 November 2014

SOUTH Australia has the highest rate of power disconnection in the nation and the number of households having their supply cut has doubled in four years to more than 10,000, a report shows.

The number of people going without electricity due to financial hardship has reached crisis point and requires action from the State Government and the energy industry, according to peak welfare lobby group SACOSS.

SACOSS, which commissioned the report, also wants the industry watchdog ESCOSA to investigate “who is being disconnected, why this is so and how disconnections across water, electricity and gas retailers relate.”

The report shows the number of householders disconnected from the power network jumped to more than 10,500 in 2012/13 — up from less than 4,800 in 2009/10.

And SA has the highest rate of disconnection in the nation, with 1.5 householders in every 100 having their power cut in 2012/13 — three times the rate recorded in Tasmania and significantly greater than the next highest rate of 1.07 recorded in Victoria.

The report included interviews with vulnerable people who had their power cut — including a woman who had significant debt because she was running medical and heating appliances for her terminally ill daughter at home.

Another woman, 19, said she had to choose between eating and paying her electricity bill, while a 36-year-old female said she had to stick bubble wrap on her windows to “keep out the cold” and reduce her energy use and bills.

The report found a combination of the highest electricity charges in the nation with “a higher proportion of low income households’’ in SA contributed to the state’s high rate of disconnections.

SACOSS executive director Ross Womersley said the Government should index its energy concession “to ensure it actually maintains its real value in line with price increases.”

“The concession has been blitzed by actual price increases — it’s little wonder people on low incomes are struggling to meet these rising costs and that the level of disconnections continue to rise.

“As importantly, retailers need to ensure they have the best possible hardship programs in place to try and prevent people who haven’t got the means to pay ever being disconnected.’’

The Government said it has “introduced a range of measures aimed at reducing cost-of-living pressures on South Australian families”, which SACOSS has welcomed.

Communities and Social Inclusion Minister Zoe Bettison said the Government “is having ongoing discussions in regards to disconnections in South Australia”.

She said recent measures taken by the government included:

INCREASING the energy and medical heating and cooling concession by $50 to a maximum of $215 per annum.

REPLACING more than 1000 costly electric hot water systems with solar systems in public housing.

INVESTING $935,000 to increase the number of financial counselling positions across the State.

Note that when the article talks about disconnections in SA hitting 10,500 in 2012/13, it’s talking about annual “rates” of disconnection: around two-thirds of those will not be reconnected.

In SA, the number of households that are currently disconnected from the grid – and face the indignity and misery of a life without electricity – is in the order of 50,000 (from a population of around 1.6 million).

So Jay, now you’ve pumped up wind power and got SA’s power prices running totally out of control, do you really think this’ll do the job?

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But the SA Labor government’s “response” (sketched out in the article above) is like the pyro-maniac fireman: having started the blaze, it wants to be seen with hose in hand – “rescuing” those its actions placed in peril in the first place.

A while back we covered SA Labor’s plans to run “re-education” camps for SA’s poorest and most vulnerable, where, no doubt, they will be given survival tips such as: how to effectively light a home with candles; how to cook with a kero stove; and how to stay warm by using more blankets (see our post here).

The Greens subscribe to same “we’ll crush them with spiralling power costs, then [somehow, magically] ‘save’ the day” style (see our post here). Hmmm …

Instead of plumping for a policy of delivering cheap, reliable sparks – Labor holds a wind power “love-in” in an effort to ensure South Australians will continue to be belted by the highest power prices in the world – for generations to come – and that thousands of households will never again be able to afford what was – only a few years back – seen as a basic necessity of decent, domestic life.

The bubble wrap just didn’t cut it.

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The cases of the 19 year old woman being left “to choose between eating and paying her electricity bill”; and that of the 36-year-old female sticking bubble wrap on her windows to “keep out the cold” and reduce her energy use and bills – are not just avoidable social tragedies.

Against the backdrop of Labor’s push for more of the same at its “emergency Clean Energy Summit” – the tens of thousands of cases like these represent nothing less than malign, political contempt for the poorest and most vulnerable in society – a class of people who traditionally look to the Labor Party to help them. But the “workers’ party” couldn’t care less about the poor – this is all about fattening up Union Super Funds, controlled by them and their union mates; and lining their own pockets along the way.

The SA government’s intimacy with the wind industry is eerily Orwellian, with the ‘1984’ falsification of reality and distortion of the truth, Newspeak and doublethink the standard media strategy, where the wind corporations mouthpiece is the premier Weatherill, Big Brother himself. And all the politicians can do is obsess about their ratings on ‘the telescreen’ with no thought for their constituents well-being whatsoever (except of course for the Labor party/union Super fund rorts).

The problem with this strategy for the premier (and fellow ‘political travellers) is that as the stench from this industry grows day by day, when it falls he is going to fall with it. Conflicted Mike Rann started it and cleanskin Jay is going to take the fall.

The core issue of trying to suppress the science and economics about industrial wind turbines is that the deception will fail in the end, as it is beginning to do. The 1980’s Kelley/NASA science has only recently been rediscovered, demonstrating scientific cause effect of low frequency noise and infrasound from wind turbines with adverse human health outcomes. Independent economic analysis is showing what lies the politicians and the industry continue to peddle about this unsustainable and reckless scam which is all about greed and nothing whatsoever to do with the environment or the people.

Bring on the independant senate investigation and bring an end to Windspeak and to this political and corporate abuse of all citizens.

SA is Labor’s showcase of how to turn a population into a Dependent of the State.
$935,000 to increase the number of financial councillors and another $235,000 for the Affordable SA helpline yes each of them worthwhile causes and yes there are always those who need help but should this form of help be increasing in a modern society? Then there is the $50 – $215pa for those who need help with power for medical reasons that’s doesn’t come close to covering one quarter of an annual cost to those who need it. What do they do for the rest of the year?
SA has been driven in to the ground by Labor and the population are frightened of changing Government because they believe they will be even worse off under a Liberal one, because they know if Labor were ousted a new Government would need to clear yet another debt left from Labor.
That so many are forced to abandon a basic necessity of a modern society is disgraceful.
That this is not just about the domestic situation, it is intertwined with the lack of employment, the loss of jobs due to the uncontrolled price of electricity.
The question is WHY, what’s in it for the Government to
destroy the State and enslave its population ensuring complete reliant on the State for their ability to survive, with very few avenues to pull free.
The Labor Governments support of this industry has been evident from the beginning, from when Weatherill as Planning Minister approved a project against advice of his department, a project which the Premier had a ‘conflict of interest’ in and it has not stopped – they have changed Acts, regulations, rules to suit the industry to the detriment of the population, they have raised the % of Renewables this state has to have to a point greater than anywhere else in the Nation and possible a great deal of the world 33+%. If they could get away with it they would have the whole of the vacant land in this State smothered with these torpedoes of destruction. The question is WHY AND WHAT FOR.
Finally just a note – John Hewson is a man I have no respect for especially after listening to him warble on at Portland where he ridiculed those who are suffering where his total emphasis was on money making.

Perhaps the reason this amazing nonsense continues in this country relates to the fact billions of dollars have been spent on a failing education system. The figures are showing that despite all the money spent on education our literacy and numeracy skills are plummeting and hence our capacity to think rationally and add up are also plummeting. All these people then rely on ‘public’ funding for survival including their fantasy of powering themselves with wind farms for ‘free’. Believing the propaganda of wind farm proponents must surely now qualify as a ‘mental illness’ which, of course, qualifies you for more welfare! If our citizens can’t work out the reality then our politicians who know the truth have to develop some gumption and ‘lead’ the way.Congratulations to those who do – the rest are pathetic.

So the crazy claims for wind power are finally being debunked! What I want to see is an all embracing investigation of the con men and their so called scientific supporters to establish how deep the lies were and all the people whose pockets were being lined to propagate this massive con. I want to see prison sentences handed out; pensions being stopped; assets being seized and justice being dispensed, at long last

Where is the great man from Far North Queensland, the Bruce, when I need him?
He cuts straight to the chase in his inimitable way in, which I lack.

How can anyone in this wealthy, at the top of the tree country, be without the most basic necessity of electricity, power?

Why is it so, that ALL of the press are not demanding answers from the governance of the day?
Why, if the people of the press are not ignorant of this abomination, are they/we not demanding answers?

What has happened to the society in which I was raised where we generally and genuinely felt it was a part of duty as humanity to care for each other?

This is quite different from the left of politics today, which is about blatant self-interest and political ambition.

It is obvious to me that if I were to be in the position to argue the point, with regard to legitimate people seeking asylum from horror, as opposed to financial opportunists, Milne and Hanson-Young would not have an argument.

Yes Nick, I would consider.

The wind industry is nothing more or less than an opportunistic parasitical organisation, which in earlier days was disorganised, but in the last decade has been extremely well organised with the likes of Gary Weaven of IFM, investing the monies of the naive, ignorant and on the whole innocent, workers of Australia.

I dearly hope that the working class, the backbone of Australian industry, and more importantly the greatest taxpayers of this once great country, will awaken and realise they are being “Ripped Off” by the very people that are meant to be looking after them.
It may appear a difficult comparison, but I put it to you the working class of this once great country, the union movement and Pacific Hydro are no better than peadophiles.
They are f#$&ing our future and therefore our children right under our noses.

I stayed in Adelaide, SA very recently.
Had been perplexed as to why I was charged the same price for 2 nights accommodation when put up in a feral, stale/stinking, eighties nightmare – through the same last Minute website that (had only a week earlier) found me a magnificent, fancy one bedroom executive suite in a five star Canberra hotel…

I do not know how John Hewson can sleep at night. Shame on you and others like you. This industry is bad, bad, bad!

Environmentalist Dr. David Bellamy, who has commented in the UK press on the Wind Farm “Scam”, has also spoken of how some people are resorting to buying and burning second hand books just to keep warm through the winter! How bad does this situation have to get before something is done. The warning signs are there for all to see.

The Senate Enquiry cannot come soon enough.

When I look at Pacific Hydro’s Stage IV wind turbines going up around the city of Portland in Southwest Victoria, it is like watching a car crash in slow motion. Portland may have lost 85 wind tower manufacturing jobs, but it has now lost the city too!
You cannot escape the turbines that now skirt the city limits on three sides. This is one of the worst examples of “greed” I have ever seen. Greed and “Dickensian” planning laws that have combined to destroy this city, and nearby Cape Bridgewater. The time is now coming to hold those responsible to account.

Damm right, Wind energy is ‘fantastic’. Only the other morning the Wind turbines were working their heads off from the easterly wind and then, the wind stopped, and so did the wind turbines. However hours later in the afternoon the wind swung around to the west and away they went again, producing some sort of electricity don’t know how much. But then the storms approached from the south west and the wind got up strong and then…… they switched them off.

Oh yes, only when you live next to an Industrial Wind complex do you really get to understand what a useless enormous waste of money these BLOODY things are and how useless the Politicians are that continue to give them to us.

What’s that old saying? A fool and his money are soon parted. Guess what, when you send billions of hard earned Australian taxpayers dollars overseas it applies to our country also.

Sorry, the misspelling of Phantasy was deliberate – phantom (not really there) and fantasy (self explanatory.)
I shall have to curb my humour?
Mind you, I like your version too with its suggestion of “fans”